House tax may go up by 5% in Ghaziabad

GHAZIABAD: A meeting of the executive committee of Ghaziabad Municipal Corporation on Wednesday decided to hike house tax by 5% in the current financial year. The decision will be placed in the board meeting to be held on June 25.

"The committee has given its go ahead to hike house tax by 5%," said D K Sinha, additional municipal commissioner, GMC. The meeting, attended by mayor Ashu Verma and municipal commissioner Abdul Samad, cleared most of the 26 proposals placed before it.

Last year, the house tax was hiked by 10%. At that time, there was a proposal to hike it by 25%, which the board had struck down.

The GMC has also decided to offer a rebate to those who deposit house tax well on time. "The executive committee has given its nod to offer a rebate of 20% on house tax if it is paid between April 1 and July 31. If it is paid between August 1 and September 30, the rebate will be 15%, if it is between October 1 and November 30, the rebate will be 10%. If it is paid between December 1 and January 17, the rebate will be 5%," said Sinha. The civic agency has nearly 2.8 lakh consumers in five zones and it aims to fill its coffers through the latest hike.

The proposal to levy fines on different categories of encroachments has also been modified. Earlier, the GMC had proposed fines for illegal parking of two wheelers and four wheelers. "The executive committee turned down the proposal to impose fines on private two wheelers and four wheelers and instead allowed parking fines only for commercial vehicles including school buses, three wheelers and trucks," said Sinha.

In addition to this, the executive committee deliberated on the electricity department's request to provide land to install 33/11 Kv substations at 15 places. It directed the officials to identify the land.